Color Combo Popularity

[wildfire393]

There's been some discussion lately about the UW Precons, and how there have been three of them in the past twelve months and they've been among the worst value for precons. This also came up in a reddit thread talking about the relative lack of three-color commanders last year and how three color combos are just "more popular" and should be catered to more. So I did a little digging, and there hasn't been a lot of actual analysis on color combo popularity. EDHRec obviously provides commanders in descending order of popularity, but does little to aggregate that data. There's this article by Adam Styborski, but it dates from two years ago, isn't clear on its methodology, and draws some conclusions that don't seem to mesh with today's data - it shows UW as relatively popular, being in the top ten most played color combinations.

For my methodology, I loaded up EDHRec, went to the 2-year data as a table, expanded it down to the top 300 entries, copied that over to a google sheet, manually re-populated the color IDs that didn't transfer as part of that, and the summed by color ID and ranked them.

The results were as follows:

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Rank Color ID Total
1 WUBRG 61361
2 BG 37558
3 BGU 34726
4 RWB 33131
5 GU 32893
6 UB 31760
7 UR 29823
8 WUB 26950
9 UBR 26610
10 RGW 24321
11 BR 22600
12 GWU 21524
13 WB 21192
14 R 19858
15 B 19848
16 URW 19717
17 GUR 19019
18 GW 19012
19 RG 18717
20 BRG 17724
21 U 16300
22 G 16106
23 RW 15016
24 WU 14518
25 WBG 13742
26 GWUB 10500
27 RGWU 8137
28 W 6347
29 UBRG 4091
30 C 3812
31 BRGW 3750
32 WURB 1205

Some things of note:

1) Five color is the most popular combination, even after the banning of Golos (who isn't included in the source data despite having been the previous most-popular commander).
2) Four color combinations are relatively unplayed, likely due to the lack of different options. Each has 1-2 non-partner commanders and then a couple of partner pairings, and they make up five of the bottom seven results along with mono-W and Colorless. This is despite Atraxa being literally the second most popular commander.
3) UW is the least popular two-color pair and in the bottom ten overall. The other three blue pairs are at #2, #3, and #4 among two-color pairs (after only BG, which has several very popular options in Lathril, Blade of the Elves and Meren of Clan Nel Toth).
4) WBG is the least popular trio, only beating out the 4-color combos, W, and C. This somewhat surprised me, because I thought options like Nethroi, Ghave, and Karador were perennially popular. I suppose though, that most of the other shards and wedges got additional commanders in various sets in the past few years beyond just Ikoria, while WBG's only recent options have been Ikoria + Kethis.

Overall, it seems like the two biggest factors for a color pair's popularity are the popularity of the component colors (stuff with at least two of U, B, and G generally do better than those without that) or specific very popular commanders (like Kaalia/Edgar/Marchesa for WBR).

So UW suffers in both of these accounts. It's got blue, but lacks green or black. And unlike UR, it doesn't have a top 20 commander like Niv-Mizzet, Parun, with Brago barely scraping into the top 50. after UR's second most popular commander.

[Hawk]

Fascinating analysis. Especially mind-blowing is that it looks like Boros has overtaken Azorius? I guess Feather, the Redeemed and Osgir, the Reconstructor really did help redeem and reconstruct Boros out of the "lol lets smash face" doldrums and into a real archetype?

I think Azorius has a few problems these days:

1) White adds very little to blue's arsenal; white and red can at least feel complimentary with White helping Red's inability to handle big creatures and enchantments and Red helping White with good cardflow and better finishers.

2) A lot of the Azorius stuff is unfun and probably gets Rule O-ed out of contention. No one likes sitting down across from Grand Arbiter Augustin IV or a deck that's just a wall of boardwipes and counters.

3) Brago, King Eternal occupies this sort of weird space - he himself can be pretty unfun and oppressive in lower-powered metas, and he also is just so powerful and verstaile he sort of eclipses the archetypes of spirits and blinks. It's hard to not look at an Ephara, God of the Polis, Ranar the Ever-Watchful, or Yorion, Sky Nomad list and not think "this would be better with Brago at the helm and that card in the '99".

4) A lot of the other recent commanders are either pretty samey or pretty niche, limiting their mass appeal.

[Sinis]

Part of the problem is that if you're playing W/U, ostensibly half your cards are white and that means your deck is probably sub-par. Have you ever looked at the white cards in a W/U deck and thought "You know, I could forgo these and just play Simic"?

I agree largely with what @Hawk wrote. Basically it's unfun, weak, or both, and other colours are getting cards with higher ceilings.

[PrimevalCommander]

Good stuff. I don't know if I'm upset that my two favorite decks (, )are sitting in the bottom half of popular colors, or vindicated knowing I have broken the mold and not playing the same overused colors/commanders everyone else is.

As a lover of 3 color decks for my entire commander career, I now have 4 mono color decks and the simplicity of the mana base and creative restriction from mono has been a fun avenue. No mono white though because I'm a coward . I've never made a permanent 2 color commander deck in 10 years, but Boros artifacts may be calling my name since Daretti, Scrap Savant has been getting a little stale.

[wildfire393]

Part of the problem is that if you're playing W/U, ostensibly half your cards are white and that means your deck is probably sub-par. Have you ever looked at the white cards in a W/U deck and thought "You know, I could forgo these and just play Simic"?

I agree largely with what @Hawk wrote. Basically it's unfun, weak, or both, and other colours are getting cards with higher ceilings.

I mean yes, I did point out that color combos that use two of U/B/G tend to be higher ranked than colors combos that just use one. But, for instance, RW is more played than UW at the moment, on the back of having interesting and powerful commander options like Feather and Osgir. And UWR is more popular than either. Fascinatingly, RWB is the second most-played trio, based sheerly on the raw strength of their commanders, especially Kaalia and Edgar.

If we look at all UW commanders from the past five years, there's some patterns that become evident.

Many of them are cheaper creatures with middling or hatebearish effects, aimed at being Standard/Limited roleplayers or possible eternal plants, which doesn't translate well to Commander: Temmet, Vizier of Naktamun, Lavinia, Azorius Renegade, Linvala, Shield of Sea Gate, Vega, the Watcher, Hama Pashar, Ruin Seeker, Dennick, Pious Apprentice // Dennick, Pious Apparition, Dorothea, Vengeful Victim // Dorothea's Retribution, Niambi, Esteemed Speaker. Niambi, Faithful Healer falls into this group too as she's literally just an Intro Deck card made legendary for flavor reasons, and Glenn, the Voice of Calm was made to be a Walking Dead card as its main priority rather than a commander-focused cards.

Then there's a few cards with somewhat interesting abilities that just don't pack enough oomph. Taigam, Ojutai Master and Raff Capashen, Ship's Mage are the biggest examples of that. They do something interesting, but it's not interesting enough to build your entire deck around. Azor, the Lawbringer probably falls here too, as needing to survive a full turn cycle (even with a bit of built-in protection) just to cast a Sphinx's Revelation on your own turn just doesn't measure up in practice. Likewise, Kwain, Itinerant Meddler is fairly weak support for Group Hug, a strategy that's largely just bad.

Then there's cards that are good support for a strategy that just isn't good enough for commander. Kangee, Sky Warden and Inniaz, the Gale Force are just super deep on the "flying matters" archetype that's never been strong enough for an EDH table with any kind of power to it. Millicent, Restless Revenant supports spirits, and as far as Spirit tribal goes they're barely cracking into Pioneer/Modern and don't have the kind of depth that competitive tribes like Goblins, Elves, Slivers, Zombies, Vampires, etc have. Timin, Youthful Geist and Rhoda, Geist Avenger are another example, they have a pretty cool archetype with like, Verity Circle and Opposition , but that's just not deep enough on its own. It's likely the new Pilot will fall into this category as well.

Then, like Hawk pointed out, there's the Brago effect. Ranar the Ever-Watchful and Yorion, Sky Nomad are both just outclassed by Ranar at doing the primary thing they do.

I have decent hopes for Tameshi, Reality Architect and Shorikai, Genesis Engine, as they both play in some new and interesting space. I worry though that if they do succeed, it'll solely be via embracing griefy, unpopular strategies like Stax. Shorikai is great for a creatureless or creature-light deck packing all kinds of wraths, Humility, etc. Tameshi, by contrast, is basically begging you to jam the deck full of Mana Breach, Overburden, Land Equilibrium, and other stax pieces.

[plushpenguin]

Another thing I would like to mention about UW in particular is that you have a serious win condition problem. Even if you're trying to annoy the table with our good friend the Grand Arbiter, you still find that without some kind of compact combo, your ability to win is glacially slow. Even among compact combos, UW's ones are generally inferior to those available in other color combinations.

[Sinis]

I have decent hopes for Tameshi, Reality Architect and Shorikai, Genesis Engine, as they both play in some new and interesting space. I worry though that if they do succeed, it'll solely be via embracing griefy, unpopular strategies like Stax. Shorikai is great for a creatureless or creature-light deck packing all kinds of wraths, Humility, etc. Tameshi, by contrast, is basically begging you to jam the deck full of Mana Breach, Overburden, Land Equilibrium, and other stax pieces.

Tameshi is awful, IMO. It looks like "Cast artifacts from your graveyard" with a lot of extra steps (including the painful one of bouncing a land? I guess we get a card). But, we already do that, and it's on Emry, Lurker of the Loch.

I agree that the chief interesting part about Tameshi is the bounce-cantrip sentence, which could play well with things like Sunken Hope or similar. But, I'm not holding my breath that White is going to add anything to it; I'm also sure that if you're playing the strongest bounce (read: Stax) pieces that you mentioned, you'll just get hated out of the game.

Shorikai... It's very unique. Not sure what to think of it yet.

[Hawk]

Tameshi could have been so cool without that stinky "1 per turn" or without the "noncreature" clauses, and I'd have even paid 1 mana per card to effectively have a global Azorius Aethermage. If it triggered on everything like Neyith of the Dire Hunt (for a comparison of a Commander released in the last stretch), it would have done wonders to give folks a reason to approach the longbox of cards and dig out all sorts of quirky stuff as Osgir and Feather and Neyith have. As written, this card more or less forces you to do hideously unfun Overburden/Mana Breach/Storm Cauldron stuff to get any reliable value churning. His other ability is only a marginal side-grade to Hanna, Ship's Navigator, a commander who has been power-crept into oblivion, and white isn't bringing enough to the party to help him compete with Emry, Lurker of the Loch if you really want an artifact durdles deck.

[Dunharrow]

Another thing I would like to mention about UW in particular is that you have a serious win condition problem. Even if you're trying to annoy the table with our good friend the Grand Arbiter, you still find that without some kind of compact combo, your ability to win is glacially slow. Even among compact combos, UW's ones are generally inferior to those available in other color combinations.

totally agree. UW control is a lot of fun until you realize that the best win condition is Approach of the Second Sun. Planeswalkers are not go win conditions in commander, and you can't rely on a single finisher like Aetherling... UW control was so fun in standard, ahh those were the days.

[wildfire393]

I have decent hopes for Tameshi, Reality Architect and Shorikai, Genesis Engine, as they both play in some new and interesting space. I worry though that if they do succeed, it'll solely be via embracing griefy, unpopular strategies like Stax. Shorikai is great for a creatureless or creature-light deck packing all kinds of wraths, Humility, etc. Tameshi, by contrast, is basically begging you to jam the deck full of Mana Breach, Overburden, Land Equilibrium, and other stax pieces.

Tameshi is awful, IMO. It looks like "Cast artifacts from your graveyard" with a lot of extra steps (including the painful one of bouncing a land? I guess we get a card). But, we already do that, and it's on Emry, Lurker of the Loch.

I agree that the chief interesting part about Tameshi is the bounce-cantrip sentence, which could play well with things like Sunken Hope or similar. But, I'm not holding my breath that White is going to add anything to it; I'm also sure that if you're playing the strongest bounce (read: Stax) pieces that you mentioned, you'll just get hated out of the game.

Shorikai... It's very unique. Not sure what to think of it yet.

Do note that with Tameshi you can also return enchantments. And the land bounce can lead to ETB land abuse (Mystic Sanctuary anyone?). Adding white probably makes it a bigger deal too. Do note that Sunken Hope in particular won't work since it triggers specifically on non-creature bounces. There's still a fair number of ways to pump out regular card draw from it.

I dunno. The card is at least interesting to me. Most of the recent UW Commanders I haven't paid much attention to beyond "Okay I can see how this would be built and I don't care" (though Timin/Rhoda did tempt me because I love me some Opposition), but Tameshi and Shorikai have at least got me thinking about building them.

[Sinis]

Do note that with Tameshi you can also return enchantments. And the land bounce can lead to ETB land abuse (Mystic Sanctuary anyone?). Adding white probably makes it a bigger deal too. Do note that Sunken Hope in particular won't work since it triggers specifically on non-creature bounces. There's still a fair number of ways to pump out regular card draw from it.

I dunno. The card is at least interesting to me. Most of the recent UW Commanders I haven't paid much attention to beyond "Okay I can see how this would be built and I don't care" (though Timin/Rhoda did tempt me because I love me some Opposition), but Tameshi and Shorikai have at least got me thinking about building them.

Oh, I missed the noncreature part.

You're right in that there are at least a lot of angles in it. Maybe I'm giving it a short shrift, here.

[JovialJovian]

I guess I've never noticed a shortage of WU commanders, but usually I am the one playing them, having run Niambi, Esteemed Speaker, Niambi, Faithful Healer, Vega, the Watcher, and Daxos of Meletis over the years. Though one of my friends has also played Lavinia, Azorius Renegade. I think it's more a recent phenomenon that has pushed WU down in the rankings, with some very underwhelming precons, and a slate of legends from most recent sets that focus on: flyers/cards, or can't stand up as a commander, like the two Disturb legends, Dorothea, Vengeful Victim // Dorothea's Retribution and Dennick, Pious Apprentice // Dennick, Pious Apparition. A case of being left behind as design focus has been looking towards boosting Boros's traditionally weak showing.

[Magiqmaster]

I am currently in the initial stage of trying to partner these 2: Ishai, Ojutai Dragonspeaker + Keleth, Sunmane Familiar. Not too sure about the direction to take (+1 counters are overdone, but I might have a few of those effects). I agree, this color combo is not great, however it is the only one still missing in my EDH decks, so I like the challenge.

The dream is to make Ishai big enough to kill via commander damage, so I will have to include lots of protection. Any ideas to make this work? My meta is not hyper competitive, but still good.

Thanks!

[TheAmericanSpirit]

I love azorius personally. Counterspells, boardwipes, some primo spot removal and few finishers and a solid classic control deck is born. Screw the results, we have rules.

[pokken]

I feel like boros, rakdos and orzhov are still significantly worse than azorius from a power level perspective unless you're trying to combo, because the interaction and card selection suite in UW is just so good. But I'm super biased toward having Mana Drain and Unexpectedly Absent level answers, and Cyclonic Rift and Hour of Revelation level sweepers.

There are a handful of super powered commanders that are very popular of all those two color pairs (wr, wb, rb) but it's the general not the color combo -- Feather, the Redeemed does not play at all like a boros general.

[Cyberium]

WH is also the color pair known for stax and prison decks. Do you think perhaps deck type available for certain color pairs contribute to lower popularity too?

[wildfire393]

I feel like boros, rakdos and orzhov are still significantly worse than azorius from a power level perspective unless you're trying to combo, because the interaction and card selection suite in UW is just so good. But I'm super biased toward having Mana Drain and Unexpectedly Absent level answers, and Cyclonic Rift and Hour of Revelation level sweepers.

There are a handful of super powered commanders that are very popular of all those two color pairs (wr, wb, rb) but it's the general not the color combo -- Feather, the Redeemed does not play at all like a boros general.

Personally though, I don't care super hard about "interaction". Like yeah, at a cEDH level you want fast, efficient, and flexible answers, but when I'm playing at casual tables I rarely find myself slotting in cards like Swords to Plowshares or even Cyclonic Rift because I find them boring. My Blue/X decks that lean heavier on the interactive and restrictive elements generally end up dominating games as least as hard as my value-synergy-engine type decks, but it feels like it's less fun for everyone involved because I'm just saying "no, you don't get to do that" a bunch of times.

But for any of the UW commanders that even slightly interest me lately, it seems like that's how they're going to play out. Shorikai, Genesis Engine is gonna run some vehicle synergy stuff, but the bulk of what's actually going to work there is going to be stuff that takes advantage of the fact that he's a fat creature that won't die to wrath, so I'm going to end up packing a whole pile of wraths and Meekstone type effects myself. Tameshi, Reality Architect might be able to do a decent white catchup-ramp value package, but stuff like Overburden, Mana Breach, and Land Equilibrium seems too good to ignore but also miserable to play against. Rhoda, Geist Avenger and Timin, Youthful Geist is just going to be a deck that looks to drop Opposition aggressively and churn out enough tokens to lock down anything meaningful under it.

There's a definite dearth of UW value engine commanders that make me want to play something unique that doesn't just look to poop in everyone else's cheerios. They don't have anything like Feather, the Redeemed or Teysa Karlov or Prosper, Tome-Bound or Chainer, Nightmare Adept.

[Ardeyn]

Really interesting data. 😊
Would it be possible to weigh the results according to available number of Commanders? I mean, it's rather natural that the four color combinations have fewer decks since they have far fewer potions as to what to build. In Atraxa's color identity there are only 8 possible decks, whereas Mardu has 45 options.
Just wondering what it would look like if this was taken into account.

Thanks for the work!
Ardeyn

[hyalopterouslemur]

To be fair, the four-color commanders also are highly modular, but that just leads to an "all over the place" feeling. At least Atraxa suggests superfriends or some slow infect. And Breya naturally lends herself to Eggs. But Saskia can be tokens, hatebears, reanimator, fatties, infect, or just a generic "screw blue" deck. Yidris is 100% modular. And Kynaios and Tiro are group hug, though a landfall deck exists. Speaking of landfall, that's what Omnath is.

A newer player can feel daunted by this embarrassment of choices.

[RowanKeltizar]

EDH Deckbuilding has a video on color pairing popularility that also looks at specific commanders. Video was from July of last year so some things have changed since then.

Of note, he only includes the top 12 commanders in each color combination and excludes 4 color commanders.

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Here's your list with mana symbols:

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1 WUBRG 61361
2 BG 37558
3 BGU 34726
4 RWB 33131
5 UG 32893
6 UB 31760
7 UR 29823
8 WUB 26950
9 UBR 26610
10 WRG 24321
11 BR 22600
12 WUG 21524
13 WB 21192
14 R 19858
15 B 19848
16 WUR 19717
17 GUR 19019
18 WG 19012
19 RG 18717
20 BRG 17724
21 U 16300
22 G 16106
23 RW 15016
24 WU 14518
25 WBG 13742
26 GWUB 10500
27 WURG 8137
28 W 6347
29 UBRG 4091
30 C 3812
31 BRGW 3750
32 WURB 1205

We can definitely use lists like this to see where certain colors need more attention from wizards.

The problem is, the format has gotten so efficient and there is so much card draw available for certain colors. If your commander doesn't have card advantage built into it, you are already starting the game at a disadvantage.

As a companion to this list I would like to see a list that categorizes commanders based on their abilities: card advantage, ramp, tokens, value, etc... and I am sure that some pretty clear trends would emerge.

In general, this is what I would like to see from wizards in the coming years:

1. A white commander that is powerful, fun, and exciting to build around, preferably several Mono white has been sitting at the bottom of the popularity list for quite some time. I think wizards failure to create a suitable commander for white is indicative of where the color sits in the format. It's a great companion color, but falls behind inherenty due to its own restrictions in what it's allowed to do as well as the focus on the unpopular theme of control.


2. More Temur and Abzan commanders. I was hoping for a couple from Kamigawa since we got the other 3 color combos.

3. More powerful colored artifacts. I get wizards reluctance to print powerful and efficient colorless artifacts, but it is severely limiting when trying to build themed decks. I think printing artifacts with a colored component in their cost is a good way around that restriction. I am mainly looking for more card draw, ramp, and interaction in this direction.

4. Work on normalizing tax, stax and control in the format. I really think as the format becomes faster and more consistent, these archetypes become more important to the health of the format, and I think the relative unpopularity of blue and white can be addressed in the same move. I think printing commanders with control aspects but without being too limiting in what they are doing is a step in the right direction. As overpowered as Smothering Tithe is, I think it was a step in the right direction giving otherwise underdog archetypes and strategies a bit of leg up and a way of punishing overzealous card draw. Printing less splashable pieces like this would be good.

Fixed Smothering Tithe 1WW

Whenever an opponent draws a card during their turn, except for the first card drawn that turn, that player may pay 1. If that player doesn't, you create a Treasure token.

[wildfire393]

In general, this is what I would like to see from wizards in the coming years:

1. A white commander that is powerful, fun, and exciting to build around, preferably several Mono white has been sitting at the bottom of the popularity list for quite some time. I think wizards failure to create a suitable commander for white is indicative of where the color sits in the format. It's a great companion color, but falls behind inherenty due to its own restrictions in what it's allowed to do as well as the focus on the unpopular theme of control.

Yeah, mono-white is in a really weird/awkward spot, especially when you compare it to mono-red. Red and white are the two "bad" colors, so why is it that mono-red is the most-played mono-color and mono-white the least? (With red being about 3x as popular if you look at the top 300 commanders like I did.) The biggest reason is the commanders. White has only 5 commanders with over 1000 lists, with the highest being around 1800. Red has 11 commanders with over 1000 lists, 3 have over 2000 (with a fourth being only 6 lists shy), and the most-played has over 4000, verging on 5000. The most played red commander, Krenko, has more lists than the top three white commanders combined. Commanders like Krenko, Daretti, and Purphoros are just crazy powerful in a way that white has nothing to compete with. And this has been the case for ages; back in 2010-2011 era, commanders like Kiki-Jiki and Godo were verging on top-tier as mono-red, but the best white could put up was like... Eight-and-a-Half-Tails? And the imbalance has continued in the years since.

To make matters worse, Red has more cards that reward you for being mono-red than white does for mono-white. Red has Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle to White's Emeria, the Sky Ruin, but that's where the comparisons basically end. Red has Gauntlet of Might for a powerful Caged Sun effect at a discount, plus the various Blood Moon and Ruination type effects that reward you for playing a mostly-basic mana base. White has nothing comparable.

2. More Temur and Abzan commanders. I was hoping for a couple from Kamigawa since we got the other 3 color combos.

I dunno if I agree with this, especially for Temur. Temur has a ton of powerful and popular commanders, and by virtue of being blue and green, is always going to be popular. Abzan may lag a little bit, but that's mostly because it basically just does two things: Reanimation and +1/+1 counters. It could use some additional strategies, but at least it has some powerful commanders for the strategies it does have.

[Treamayne]

I would like to see W also get more Tithe/Gift of Estates spells, without having to be stapled on a creature. Though Archaeomancer's Map is a nice step in the right direction.

4. Work on normalizing tax, stax and control in the format. I really think as the format becomes faster and more consistent, these archetypes become more important to the health of the format, and I think the relative unpopularity of blue and white can be addressed in the same move. I think printing commanders with control aspects but without being too limiting in what they are doing is a step in the right direction. As overpowered as Smothering Tithe is, I think it was a step in the right direction giving otherwise underdog archetypes and strategies a bit of leg up and a way of punishing overzealous card draw. Printing less splashable pieces like this would be good.

I think the problem with most tax/stax (and LD/non-basic hate) effects are their symmetry (which isn't really symmetry, since it will almost always punish the player furthest behind far more than it reigns in the rampant draw/ramp deck). I would like to see W get more "oath"-style versions of these effects.

Instead of Armageddon; something like "Each opponent with more lands than you sacrifices X nonbasic lands, where X is the difference"

Instead of Thalia, Guardian of Thraben; something like "noncreature spells opponents cast cost 1 more to cast for each spell or ability on the stack." - or - "noncreature spells cost 1 more to cast for each spell cast this turn"

Fixed Smothering Tithe 1WW

Whenever an opponent draws a card during their turn, except for the first card drawn that turn, that player may pay 1. If that player doesn't, you create a Treasure token.

Different Fixed Smothering Tithe 1WW

Whenever an opponent draws one or more cards, if they have more cards than you, you may create a treasure or clue unless that player pays 1.

*Note: Those are very rough card concepts - not meant to be balanced or use proper templating - but to demonstrate the concept depicted

[5colorsrainbow]

I just think in general nearly all the color(s)/combos need more variety in their archetypes. The two color pairs have long been doing what was done in Ravnica, with strixaheven having carve out new spaces for the enemy color pairs. The three color pairs are kinda similar but I think thats also the fact three color sets and cards are tricker to make so we have seen less of them.

I'd personally like to see another set of four color decks to also broad the four colors commanders out some more. They now have "partner with" and or have the secret lair "Friends forever" (as in the legends in the set can only pair with those from the decks) to help to stop the past partners from getting too boosted if they don't wanna do multiple straight four color legends.

[Shabbaman]

I can't help but think that color combinations like Golgari are popular for reasons beyond ratio. "Once you go GB, you won't go back", it's a lifestyle choice. I know that's why I have several Golgari decks. But it's a feeling not backed by such a solid data analysis.

What puzzles me is that if you take a look at the most popular cards on EDHREC you'd have to scroll down quite a bit to find the first black card.

[Emily77]

Part of the problem is that if you're playing W/U, ostensibly half your cards are white and that means your deck is probably sub-par. Have you ever looked at the white cards in a W/U deck and thought "You know, I could forgo these and just play Simic"?

I agree largely with what @Hawk wrote. Basically it's unfun, weak, or both, and other colours are getting cards with higher ceilings.

The point raised here highlights a common challenge when running a White/Blue (W/U) deck in a card game. It questions the value of including white cards when the synergy might be stronger with a different color like Simic. free fire name